Hey! Went away for a week there, sorry.

Seriously, can we just do this to Bloomberg? And Daley? (knock on wood…)

The City Paper takes first stab at the races for City Council, including a heads-up that Tony Ceoffe Jr. will be among those running against Patrick Dowd: City Paper

Michael Lamb passes on running for County Executive in favor of running for Mayor Controller again: Early Returns

Illyrias thinks the new-old move and arguments against conducting property assessments in Allegheny County are a bunch of collective-defeating, self-serving hogwash: Pgh Is A City

Speaking marginally of which, according to Dan Onorato’s office, Jim Ferlo wants to raise your property taxes: Tribune-Review

Mayor Ravenstahl is getting quietly slagged for passing on both Tom Corbett’s inauguration and last week’s Steelers rally: Tribune-Review (although thank heavens he has committed to attending tomorrow’s Ground the Jets rally. No word yet on whether he would make any hypothetical Trap the Bears or Fudge the Packers rally.)

Continuing along with the campaign announcements, Corey O’Connor has made it official:

“I have a passion for this city and I believe I can help make it a greater, even more livable place to live,” Mr. O’Connor, 26, said in an interview. “My ideas are that we need some new energy and new resources down in city hall. I believe I have a ability to get people to work together.” (P-G, James O’Toole)

He said a mouthful, there. Because…

“It was no secret that I had stated my intention to seek the magistrate seat held by Judge [Nathan] Firestone,” Mr. Shields said tonight. “I’m anxiously waiting any kind of determination from the Supreme Court. If we do not hear, I’ll run for the city council seat.” (ibid)

Just as I suspected (#ahem#). A heck of a lot of people are erasing their chalk and dry-erase boards right about now. I’m investing in sheet plastic and duct tape.

*-UPDATE: Chad Hermann takes a dim view of the endeavor right out of the gate.

Just dealing with some items as they come in:

Councilman Patrick Dowd is announcing his run for reelection, touting his Councils-to-Go, role with CONNECT, pool, sewer and “greenway” neighborhood projects, and how “With his colleagues, he was able to find a solution for the city’s pension crisis that maintained important public assets, and worked to address debt and infrastructure problems that have been kicked down the road for too long.” Sounds like a discussion topic!

Valerie McDonald Roberts announces her long-awaited return to interesting politics in a bid for County Controller, touting 21 years of experience in public office, re-engineering the Recorder of Deeds office and “methodically closing the gender based pay equity gap in the office, and increasing racial diversity to county demographics.” Your move, Chelsa!

Development upon the Garden Theater block is pushing up against a deadline, probably not so much due to the URA suddenly becoming a stickler as from the preferences and predilections of our incoming Governor. Here’s hoping that the market study gets underway and completed soon; I’m dispiriting of driving to Wilkinsburg to pick up bulk raisins and buckwheat groats.

Speaking of which, you can go ahead and watch PCN coverage of the inaugurations of Gov. elect Tom Corbett and Lt. Gov. elect Jim Cawley live. Right now the latter is talking about “job-crushing government regulation”.

I think this must be why we have football… few of us can manage to walk the kind of path he walked.

In the comments … pile on.

RELATED: P-G, Michael A. Fuoco. These public transit cuts cannot be allowed to become the overarching trajectory.

The end of an era. Technically.

(See coverage: WTAE; P-G; Trib; WDUQ)